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Tuesday, October 1, 2013

31 Days of Halloween 2013: Legion of Terror (October 4th at the Chagrin Documenrary Film Festival)

[LEGION OF TERROR screens
Friday October 4th at 9:30 pm at the Chagrin Documentary Film
Festival.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

Since 1985 The Legion of Terror have been working hard to scare
and disturb northeast Ohio thrill seekers at various “haunted
attractions”, mainly the Bloodview Haunted House. Rather than the
assortment of pimple-faced teens wearing decked out in cheap rubber
masks and fake blood you might expect, the Legion come from a wide
range of backgrounds. Their common bond is a desire to take their
performance and make-up skills to a higher level, creating genuine
characters and scenarios rather than just jumping out and shouting,
“boogity, boogity, boogity!” Members are not paid for their
efforts, yet most stay for many years due to the camaraderie and, in
many cases, the opportunity to engage in a little venting of pent-up
frustrations in a controlled environment. Given how tightly knit the
group has become over the course of its existence, it's no surprise
that a fair amount of behind the scenes drama takes place as well.

In his documentary LEGION OF TERROR,
director D. H. Greathouse introduces us to the people behind the
makeup, most of whom seem fairly harmless and well adjusted (although
there are one or two exceptions) and gives the early history of how
the organization came to be. Then, at about the 45 minute mark, we
get into the juicy stuff. Proving that even groups comprised of
outsiders will ultimately become embroiled in messy internal politics
and cliquishness, a series of events leads to a number of drastic
changes for the group, calling its very existence into question. Of
course if you live around Cleveland, you know everything turned out
more or less okay and the Legion is once again at Bloodview as we
speak. Still, it's interesting to see how it all plays out.

On a technical level, LEGION
is solidly shot and edited, and anyone who has an interest in
subcultures should find it at least moderately interesting. It's also
pretty amazing that Greathouse has been filming the group for so long
(since 1996), allowing us to see how the Legion evolves over time
rather than just having people in the here and now tell us about it.
My main gripe is that it spends a bit too much time on too many
individuals going over the same basic material, and after a while a
lot of the stories about why various members joined start to become
familiar and repetitious. Once the film gets into the behind the
scenes material the interest level picks up considerably, but those
more casual viewers who don't have a deep and abiding interest in
haunted attractions and the people who work in them may find their
patience tested until then. The film wouldn't have made feature
length if it had been cut much shorter, but then again not everything
needs to be a full length feature. 2 1/2 out of 4 stars.